Quote:
Originally Posted by Truenorth00
Lanagan is a tool. An ideological purist who argues against projects like HFR because HSR is the only acceptable solution to him. With "friends" like him, rail in Canada doesn't need enemies.
Guys like him like to pretend that moralizing and lecturing the public will magically result in politicians plopping down tens of billions for high speed rail.
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Agreed. He seems to suffer from delusions of grandeur, wanting everything now. I don't know of any western country that built HSR before they had frequent, reliable intercity rail service.
Quote:
Originally Posted by acottawa
I think you’re drinking the Potvin Kool-Aid. Who wants to commute 3+ hours a day? I am sure the odd person would, or somebody who primarily works from home, but that would not appeal to most office workers.
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I tend to agree with you on this one. Montreal isn't Toronto or Vancouver where people need to commute for hours because of a lack of affordable housing. Now there are other extenuating circumstances that might require this commute. I once spent about 16 months working in Montreal while living in Ottawa, though I didn't commute daily. Regardless, a faster, more frequent train ride would have been amazing!
While the train may not be the right solution for everyone, it could be the right solution for a lot more people than currently use it. As quoted an interview with the VIA president in the
winter 2016 issue of Interchange (reference found by
1overcosc in post #
115):
Quote:
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Today, 87 per cent of travel between Ottawa, Toronto and Montreal is by car, six per cent is by plane and five per cent is by train.
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That 87% by car is a huge market available for VIA Rail. They don't need to bring that down to zero, but even a 5% reduction in those who drive (to about 82.5%) in favour of the train would almost double the number of people using the train (from 5% to almost 9.5%).
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